the ripple effect
by eponnia
Summary: AU. Finnick is ordered to attend yet another party and jump into bed with yet another Capitolite. But this girl is different. Very different. [Previously titled "if you were the ocean and i was the sun". Filmverse Odesta one-shot.]


**AUTHOR'S NOTE: In a world where people name their children Peeta, Effie, Cinna, Seneca, and Enobaria and no one bats an eye, Annie seems like an odd name in Panem. In my previous Odesta fic –** ** _when you're dreaming with a broken heart_** **– I had her full name as Anemone Delta Cresta, with Annie as only a nickname, and I'm using the same system again here.**

 **This was previously titled _if you were the ocean and i was the sun_.**

* * *

In the year of the Sixty-Seventh Games, Finnick arrives at the party wearing a full tuxedo.

If this was Anemone Cresta's thirtieth birthday, he'd be wearing something far more revealing. But even though the girl he's to spend the evening with is a Capitolite, she is only just sixteen, and he doesn't want to make her uncomfortable right of the bat.

An Avox opens the door, and the partygoers cheer when they see Finnick. He plasters on an easy smile, forcing himself not to move away when hands reach out to touch him as he wades through the packed room.

"Finnick!" a woman with purple hair says over the noise, wrapping a hand around his arm as if they are old friends. "I'm so glad you could make it, darling!"

"I'm glad to be here," he lies. "Thank you for having me,"

"It's such a pleasure having you. Now let me introduce you to the birthday girl. She is so excited to meet you."

He follows Mrs. Cresta to a fur-covered couch seating with too many people. Most of the teenage girls, hair all colors of the rainbow, shriek when they see the Victor, but the girl with the natural red hair, pressed against the arm of the sofa, look extremely nervous. She's bordering on being terrified, and Finnick's stomach clenches.

"Anemone dear," Mrs. Cresta says, "I'm sure I don't need to introduce Finnick Odair."

The other girls giggle, but the redhead only says "Hello" so quietly Finnick can hardly hear her over the music.

"Hey," he says, flashing a grin – more for the sake of Mrs. Cresta and the Capitolites surrounding him than Anemone's sake, because she doesn't look like she wants attention. If Finnick had the choice, he would leave her alone because she clearly wants space. But he can't, because word will get back to Snow that Finnick is not playing his part and doing his job. He can't just leave, no matter how much he wants to.

Anemone manages a small smile in response, and her mother digs her nails into Finnick's bicep.

"Anemone dear, why don't you give our guest a tour of the house?"

Finnick keeps his face blank as the girl's green eyes widen. "Mother-"

"It wasn't easy for your father and I to arrange for Mr. Odair to be here tonight," Mrs. Cresta says in a high, breathy voice. "Show him around, won't you?"

Anemone's friends' laughter is piercing, but the girl herself blushes.

" _Anemone_ ," her mother says, an edge in her voice, and her daughter finally stands, face draining of color.

"Yes, mother."

"Good!" Mrs. Cresta releases Finnick's arm and clasps her hands together. "Take as much time as you need, you two."

Anemone turns redder than her hair. Finnick holds out an arm, and she gingerly takes hers around his elbow, careful to only let their arms touch and absolutely nothing else.

She leads him through the crowd that wolf whistles and winks, and she takes him up a marble staircase that costs more than his childhood home in Four. They arrive at a door, and she pulls her arm away to push open the door.

Almost on default, he waits until the door is shut to move forward and lean in to kiss her, but she puts a hand on his chest.

"Stop."

No Capitolite has ever said that to him before. But her green eyes are filled with genuine fear and she's breathing too fast through her nose, so he steps back.

"Okay."

She fiddles with her hair as he stands there, watching.

"What do you want to do?"

"Nothing," she blurts out. "I know my parents paid for you to be here and do… this with me. But I didn't know you were coming, and I wouldn't have invited you. I mean…" She sighs. "I would have invited you as a guest. Nothing more."

Finnick finds himself smiling, and Anemone raises an eyebrow.

"You certainly are different, Annie."

"Annie?" She wrinkles her nose. "My name is–"

"Anemone, I know. But you seem like Annie." When she just looks at him, he fiddles with his cuffs. "Sorry. I shouldn't have said that."

"It's fine." She smiles. "I like it, actually." After a moment, she asks, "What did you mean when you said I'm different?"

"Oh, most Capitolites would have thrown money at me and dragged me to bed the moment they saw me. But you…"

"Yes?"

"You… didn't." His voice cracks, ever so slightly.

Immediately his walls that he didn't realize where crumbling started to go up again. How could he be so stupid and open up to a _Capitolite_? This was probably just her ploy to get him into her bed after all. True, none of his bedfellows had ever explicitly told him to stop before, but this had to be a trick, right? No Capitolite was this decent.

But before he can even put his mask of charm and smirks back on, Annie says, "So are you, Finn."

No one had ever called him Finn before.

"Well, we haven't been in here long enough for anyone to believe we've…" Annie flushes. "You know."

"Will anyone ask?"

"Oh, my mother will probably check on us at some point. So we should at least get in bed." She blushes once more but bends down to remove her shoes, and Finnick does the same. She sits on the edge of the bed and starts to remove the pins in her hair as he stands awkwardly over her. "I'll tell my parents we were together tonight, and you will be paid the full amount."

Finnick does not know how to respond.

Part of him thinks that he shouldn't be paid for not working, because Snow surely will find out. But this girl is offering to give him a night off instead of using him like all the others, and his body is still sore from his time with that politician only the evening before.

The deep aching in his bones wins.

"If that's what you want," he says.

She looks him in the eye. "That's what I want. "

After a moment, he looks away first. "I'll take the floor."

"It's okay," Annie begins. "You can take a side of the bed–"

"I'd rather take the floor," he insists, heart pounding.

"Okay," Annie says gently.

Finnick sheds his bowtie and suit jacket, folding them carefully and placing them at the foot of Annie's huge bed. The floor is covered in carpet so plush it is easier on his back than his old childhood bed before his Games, back when his family was poor. His overworked body still protests despite the luxury, but Annie is looking down at him, and the seventeen-year-old Victor masks his pain with a smile.

"Admiring the view, Annie?" he quips out of habit.

She snorts. "Lay off it, Odair." The redhead sighs, cheek pressed against her pillow. "Can I ask you a question?"

"Sure."

"What's the ocean like?"

He raises an eyebrow. "Why do you ask?"

"The largest body of water I've seen is a swimming pool. I've always wanted to know what life outside the Capitol is like."

Finnick stares up at the ceiling and draws in a slow breath.

He tells her about the sea, and the surf running over the sand, and the huge waves that flood Four. He describes how his father, only a deckhand on one of the great ships, taught him to fish with a net and a line and a spear. He explains how his mother baked the best seaweed bread and fried the best cod in all of Four. He relates about collecting seashells and seeing dolphins jumping waves and the taste of saltwater and the feeling of sand between his toes. He recounts how the sound of the ocean is the one thing guaranteed to help him fall asleep – not Capitol drugs, not Capitol alcohol – and how it's harder to drift off anywhere else.

He tells her about home, and she listens to every word.

* * *

 **AUTHOR'S NOTE: The mention of Finnick always choosing to sleep on the floor because of... everything, is inspired by _Exit Light, Exit Night_ by grumpkin_snark, and is a headcanon that I both heartily agree ****with and that which also makes me cry.**

 **This has nothing to do with this fic, but I just wanted to let everyone know something. God answered my prayers in giving me answers about a previously unknown illness I have been dealing with for almost two years. I haven't had a definite diagnosis in that entire time until now. To quote the movie _God's Not Dead_ , "God is good all the time. And all the time, God is good."**


End file.
